Young suspect arrested for ‘honour killing’

KARACHI: A young man was arrested on Thursday by the Sohrab Goth police for killing a 35-year-old man, the father of five, apparently because he suspected that the victim was fond of his married sister, who was also shot dead in her house earlier, witnesses and police said.

They said that the arrested suspect, Ibrahim, 28, son of Ali Sher, along with his brother and three other relatives shot dead the victim, Mohammed Aslam, a labour contractor and resident of Faqeera Goth, a shantytown in Sohrab Goth, at the house of one of the suspects in a nearby shantytown, Saifal Goth, at around 10am.

Earlier at around 8.40am, the suspect’s sister, Shamim, 40, wife of Mohammed Sharif, the mother of five and resident of Khamiso Goth, a shantytown in the remit of the neighbouring New Karachi Industrial Area police station, was shot dead at her house by an unidentified attacker whose face remained covered because he was wearing a helmet.

The North Karachi Industrial Area police said that the victim woman’s mother, Haleema Bibi, lodged a case (FIR 329/2009) against unidentified attackers under Sections 302 (premeditated murder) and 34 (common intention) of the Pakistan Penal Code.

The complainant told the police that she was in her room, her victim daughter in the verandah and her 16-year-old granddaughter, Bushra, was in the kitchen when she heard a gunshot. She stated that she came out to find her daughter lying in the verandah with blood oozing out of her temple.

The complainant quoted Bushra as saying that an attacker, clad in trousers and a shirt and his face covered because he was wearing a helmet, came into the house, pumped a bullet to the victim’s head and fled on a motorcycle.

The woman’s body was moved to the Abbasi Shaheed Hospital for a post-mortem examination. Sources at the hospital’s medico-legal section told Dawn that the victim was hit by a single bullet from pointblank range and the bullet went through her skull.

The Sohrab Goth police said that the labour contractor was shot dead by the suspects, Ibrahim, his brother, Zulfiqar alias Zulfi, Ayaz, Ismail and Inayat who were named in the FIR (503/209) registered under Sections 302 and 34 of the PPC on the complaint of the victim’s paternal uncle.

The official in charge of the Sohrab Goth police kiosk, ASI Ehsan Ullah Marwat, told Dawn that the suspects had fled the scene after killing Aslam Bhatti, but the police managed to arrest Ibrahim.

He said that both the suspects and the victim hailed from Bahawalpur and the suspects believed that the victim had a relationship with their married sister.

The police official said that the victim stayed overnight at the house of Inayat, who was one of his employees. He said that the suspects also beat up the victim severely before they pumped three bullets into his head and chest.

He said that the arrested suspect’s elder brother, Zulfiqar, had a criminal record and he was believed to have masterminded the killing of the man and his sister.
Source: Dawn
Date:8/7/2009